Goodbye California!

Hi Everyone! I just got off of my flight from Sacramento and I’m now in Salt Lake City, Utah. I was to have flown out to Bozeman, Montana within the hour, but they cancelled the flight and I’m booked for the 8:23 PM one instead. Argh!! So, being adventuresome, I decided to rent time at an internet Kiosk. I’ll try to get some needed exercise by walking the terminal a little bit later before settling into an airport restaurant for some airport-style food. 🙂

I have enjoyed just over a week in California visiting friends, family, and seeing many sights. My motto for the summer is Reconnect as I do just that with many of our family members and friends.

Today I said goodbye to Dottie, Ed, and Dottie’s daughters, Katie and Natalie, after a lovely visit with them. They live in the Manteca/Escalon area, which is south of Sacramento. After 9 years, it was wonderful to see Dottie and the girls again and to meet Ed.

After my last update in San Diego from the public library, I had a two day visit near Julian, CA with a cousin and her hubby. This was the first time we’ve met and Bobbi Jane and Monte were wonderful. The heart-warming part of this visit was helping her to reclaim her ties to the Vale side of the family. She was one of my Mom’s first cousins and it was lovely to see familiar features of my Mother and her Vale/McClester side in Bobbi’s features and some of her mannerisms. They live on a beautiful rambling, ranch outside of Julian, which was a perfect contrast to the hustle-bustle of coastal Southern California. Unfortunately, my trek between San Diego to Julian wasn’t so perfect as I was the last victim of a 5 car rear-end accident near Ramona. The driver of the full-size pickup who started the domino effect was needless to say heartsick. Fortunately, there were NO injuries. Now it’s just the annoyance of dealing with the rental company and insurance companies. I was never so relieved to finally get to my cousins’ ranch!!

Steve will be nearing West Yellowstone today. With cell phone coverage sketchy, I’m prepared to not hear from him today. He’s made reservations for us to stay in Yellowstone a couple of nights, which will be nice. I imagine while he bikes throughout Yellowstone I’ll be busy with my camera and soaking in the scenery. I’ve been to Yellowstone at least once in each season over the years so it’ll be nice to experience late spring once again. Last time though, it snowed!!

We are grateful for our kids’ updates to the website in our absence. I’m finding it quite entertaining to learn more about some of Steve’s stops along the way. Perhaps they will include some links to San Diego, L.A., Julian, or northern California???!!

Thanks for the wonderful comments along the way. It’s quite encouraging!
~~Until later……Diane

One Reply to “Goodbye California!”

Hi Diane, Thank you so much for the lovely gifts. delicious chocolate and thoughtful card! It was so good to see you again and I can’t wait to see the California pictures of bikinis by the pool 🙂 I’m glad we had a chance to reconnect and trust that we will not have another nine years before we see each other again. Katie and I stopped by the German store on the way home and bought our German weenies, broetchen, marzipan and other goodies–yum, yum! We hope that we’ll be able to get together again as families, so that we’ll be able to see Steve and the kids too. We’ll continue to visit your website to keep track of your progress. Our prayers and love will accompany you. Thank you for visiting with us and making it seem as if nine years hadn’t passed at all. I love you lots,
Dottie